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New rules for managing the EU external fishing fleet [EU Legislation in Progress]

Following trilogue negotiations, the Parliament is to be asked to approve in plenary a revised system of issuing and managing fishing authorisations, intended to improve monitoring and transparency of the EU external fishing fleet. The new legislation will replace the current ‘Fishing Authorisations Regulation’ 1006/2008, and will cover all EU vessels fishing outside EU waters, as well as third-country vessels fishing in EU waters.

The current scope of the authorisation system would be extended to include practices poorly monitored so far, such as private agreements between EU companies and third countries and abusive reflagging operations. Member States would authorise fishing vessels using common eligibility criteria, complemented by specific conditions depending on the nature of the authorisation. Part of the electronic fishing authorisations register, showing who fishes what and where, would for the first time be publicly accessible.